BEIRUT (Reuters) - Gunmen loyal to President Bashar al-Assad shot dead at least six mediators sent to try to reconcile warring sectarian groups in the province of Homs, where people on opposing sides in Syria's war had until now been able to coexist, residents said on Tuesday.Full story

HOMS COUNTRYSIDE, Syria (Reuters) - For months, the western rural region of Homs was an unusual model of coexistence in Syria's brutal two-year-old civil war. Now, it risks becoming a dark episode in the country's deepening sectarian conflict. Full story

AMMAN (Reuters) - An influential Islamist cleric turned rebel commander urged Syrian insurgents on Wednesday to focus their war on President Bashar al-Assad's Alawite heartland to create a "balance of terror" and help turn the tide of the conflict. Full story

Related Photos

In this Tuesday, April 30, 2013 photo, Ali Faddah, a senior official with the pro-Syrian Arab Democratic Party, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press at the party's offices, in the predominantly Alawite neighborhood of Jabal Mohsen in the northern port city of Tripoli, Lebanon. The pi